Dear John
by Hawki
Summary: Oneshot: A "dear John letter" wasn't what he was writing exactly. But he knew it would be his last farewell regardless.


**Dear John**

_Dear John_

The green text hung there on the black screen, like verdant islands in a dark sea. Not that James Raynor had seen many seas in his lifetime, what with spending much of his life on planets such as Shiloh and Mar Sara, but still, the analogy remained in his mind. If the words were like islands however, they offered him little sanctuary. Dark was the screen, and dark was the night, as night eternal swept over the Koprulu sector. Zerg, protoss, and even terrans, all serving the same dark artificer, all apparently without any goal outside killing everything and everyone. Beneath a night sky he'd told Artanis that fate wasn't written. Now, in one of the last holdouts on Tarsonis, he was beginning to have second thoughts. The Moebius Corps' supply lines had been cut, but with a swarm of zerg ever pushing against the Dominion forces here, chances were they'd have to pull out.

_Déjà vu then._

He'd been on this planet once before – when he'd contributed to the deaths of over 2 billion people, and come back down to the planet to save the life of just one of them. With the help of terrans, the zerg had destroyed the Confederacy. Again, with the help of terrans, the zerg looked set to wipe out the Dominion forces here. Tarsonis was a dead world, but it was an important one, and if Tarsonis fell to Amon's forces, then Korhal could be struck again with impunity.

And in spite of all that, he couldn't help but look at the screen. At what he had started to type. He frowned, his fingers hovering above the keys before he laid back in his chair and closed his eyes, rubbing them. He could be flowery when he needed to be. Fekk's sake, he'd pulled a speech out of his arse on Char only two years ago, and that had captured the hearts and minds of people who'd previously wanted to kill him. Now he couldn't get past two fekking words.

_Oh to be a soldier again, _he thought. He stared at the screen.

_Figure you are a soldier._

He spun round in his chair, pistol in hand.

_Nice gun. I'd hate to break it._

He scowled, and not just because the threat ran true. He holstered the revolver and returned to the computer screen. "Fekk's sake girl, keep your hands out of my mind."

"Well, they aren't really hands, but…" She walked over and Raynor looked up at her. Nova Terra. Agent X41822N. Dominion Ghost. Someone who'd been his enemy only a year ago, and someone who he suspected wasn't too keen on the new arrangement they had together. Not after Tosh at least.

"We need to talk," Nova said.

"Actually, what I need is some peace and quiet," Raynor said.

"You're the commander of all Dominion forces here."

"I know. Therefore, I know I need me-time. So you're free to get in you-time, before my me time ends, and I give you a job to do." He fell silent, looking at the screen.

"I can see you're making the most of it," Nova said.

"You still here?"

"I am."

Raynor glanced at her. "This about the Heaven's Devils blondie? Because much as I might sympathize that they're showing you up, I-"

She pulled something out of her stealth suit and tossed it on the table. "This is what I'm here for," she said.

Raynor looked at it. It was a data chip. He looked back at up and her and murmured, "this supposed to mean something?"

"I don't know. Could be something to do with you accessing the Ghost Academy database through a backdoor at 2407 hours. Accessing files that are above your paygrade."

Raynor slowly turned away and looked back at the screen. "Valerian trusts me."

"I know he does. I'm betting that trust extends so far as to even give you the opportunity to access the files on Ursa." She began walking around the command tent – past the holo-table, past some hydralisk skulls dangling down, past the dartboard and scattered cans of beer. "Was it being here that did it? On Tarsonis? Where the old Ghost Academy used to be?"

"Get out," Raynor said.

"No. Not until I get an explanation."

"Do I need to make it an order?"

"You can. But in these circumstances, I don't have to follow it. Not until I get something from you." Nova leant back against the table and folded her arms. Raynor swivelled around in his chair and looked at her. Specifically, one particular part of her.

_Eyes at my face cowboy._

_Go to hell._

_Don't know if you've noticed, but we're already there._

Raynor conceded the point, if only to get her out of his head. He figured that if Nova wanted to know what he'd accessed, she could just take the info out of his head like a hand reaching for peanuts, but whatever leeway she had as a Ghost operative, he guessed it didn't extend as far as to a Dominion commander.

"You still don't trust me, do you?" Raynor murmured.

Nova said nothing, but he didn't have to be a telepath to tell that he'd struck a nerve.

"Think your new emperor's being too lenient?"

"It doesn't matter what I think," she murmured.

"Oh, I think it does, and I think that you think that it does." Raynor drew out his revolver and shook out the firing chamber. He put the bullets down into his palm and began spinning the empty gun. "Come on. Give a little, get a little."

"Stop avoiding the subject."

"Those are my terms." He smirked. "So go on. What do you think?"

"I think that if Emperor Valerian Mengsk wants to pat you on the head for helping depose his father, and give Mister Horner a position in the admiralty, he's welcome to do so, but there's no requirement that I'm forced to enjoy it," Nova said.

Raynor put a bullet back in. "Go on."

"I also think that letting the Raiders operate as they are rather than melding them into the Dominion Armed Forces is a mistake, and sets a terrible precedent."

Raynor flipped the firing chamber back into the revolver.

"I also think that you're emotionally compromised, in light of the events of the past six years."

Raynor pointed the gun at the Ghost. "Lady, you've no idea."

Nova gave him a wry smile. "You know I could teek that and disable the firing mechanism, right?"

He shrugged.

"You want to test me?"

"No. I'm just thinking back to when I always saved one of these babies for Valerian's daddy." He lowered the revolver, re-opened the firing chamber, and began putting the other bullets in. "Still, now I need as many bullets as I can get."

"Usually, I make do with one," Nova murmured.

Raynor grunted. "Well, that was a good talk. So fine. I accessed the files on Ursa. What of it?"

"That you aren't allowed to access them."

Raynor put the fourth bullet in. "Think it matters now?"

"Maybe." Nova glanced at the tent's exit. "Maybe not."

Raynor put the sixth bullet in.

"Still," she murmured, "I couldn't help but notice that you were looking for a John Raynor."

The sixth bullet was put in. But the firing chamber hung out in the open.

"Well?" Nova asked.

Raynor slowly closed the chamber, and just as slowly, laid the gun in his lap.

"I'm waiting," she whispered.

"You get to keep waiting," he said. He looked up at her. "That's an order."

He spun back to the laptop. He knew that at 0540 hours he'd be seeing lieutenants and mercs in this very tent, and that was only a few hours away. But he wanted to get this off. He had to.

"I get it," Nova whispered.

His hands went to the keyboard.

"You let your three year old son go to Tarsonis at the age of three, only to be informed months later that he died in a shuttle accident."

Raynor spun round and got to his feet. "The fekk you think you-"

"Assuming the files you accessed on Ursa aren't fake, then you now know that it wasn't a cover-up. That John Raynor really did die, along with fellow trainees. That Warrant Officer Fowler had one too many cold ones the night before, and killed himself and fourteen children. It's a total waste."

Raynor just stood there, his hand lingering at his revolver. Dark circles under his eyes matched the darkness within them. Nova's green eyes appeared luminescent in the gloom. Like a cat in a tree, mocking a man who couldn't climb.

"I bet you must hate yourself," she whispered. "Letting your son go off to die like that."

Raynor raised the pistol. It was yanked out of his hands before he could even fire. In a quick motion, Nova emptied the firing chamber and tossed the weapon back to him. He caught it with both hands, cradling them. Almost like a child. One he could never bury.

"I'm sorry," she murmured.

He looked up at her. "I try to shoot you and you say you're sorry?"

"You weren't going to shoot me," Nova said. "And there's a difference between John Raynor and myself."

"What?" he murmured.

"I knew what I was in for when I joined the Ghost Program. I doubt the same could be said for him. Or any of the other children who died that day." She got to her feet and turned her back to him, staring out into the cold night air. "I doubt the people who lived here knew what to do when the zerg invaded. When they lost their children as well. Along with…everything else." She looked back at the commander. "I'll keep your secret," she said. "For now."

"What?" Raynor murmured. "Till the war's over?"

She smirked. "If it makes you feel better, by the time it's over, either we'll both be dead, or one of us will be dead."

"One of us?"

"I've killed more people than you can imagine James Raynor. I know death pretty well by this point. And if Amon's defeated, I'm sure he'll have taken one of us with him by the day's end." She gave him a small bow. "I'll be ready for my next assignment when you're ready."

Ready. The word rolled over in his eyes, buffeting him like the wind that entered the tent as Nova slipped outside, chilling his skin, his bones, his soul. Ready. For six years, it was as if he'd had to be 'ready,' to be up to speed on the next big threat to life, liberty, the universe, and everything. First it was the protoss. Then the zerg. Then the UED. Then the Dominion. And now…now, the universe had gone to hell, and stuck on the ground while Matt commanded the _Hyperion_, he'd lost any grasp on Heaven.

He didn't give the bullets lying on the ground a second glance as he sat back down and returned to his letter. His "dear John" letter, written to a dead boy who'd never read it, who'd been born by a woman long dead, leaving a man alone in the world who'd thrice lost the only other woman he'd ever loved.

_Dear John_

The words still hung there. Whispering to him. Taunting him.

_Dear John_

Reminding him that it was all for nothing. That the universe didn't care if people like James, John, or Lidya Raynor survived.

_Dear John_

Then again, the universe didn't care about anything. Despite the words of men wiser than himself, he'd seen no evidence of an arc towards justice.

_Dear John_

Justice had killed Tarsonis, he reflected. Justice had taken the life of Arcturus Mengsk and thousands of men who'd served him.

_Dear John_

One day, he suspected, justice would come for him.

_Dear John_

So all he could do was finish the letter. To write two words. The only words he could muster right now, as night, death, and sleep reached for him.

_I'm sorry._

He turned around and began to pick up the bullets. Reminded that once, he had always kept one handy for Arcturus Mengsk or Sarah Kerrigan.

These days, he always kept one for himself.


End file.
